Wednesday, August 1, 2012

Aquaman #11 - A Review

The saga from last issue continues, as Aquaman and his former allies from The Others continue the hunt for Black Manta. A collection of individuals who gather power from and/or safeguard Atlantean artifacts, The Others were apparently around before Aquaman joined The Justice League. But Arthur Curry hasn't kept in touch with his former friends and some of them are a little upset about it.

My complaints and comments regarding the structure of the current storyline from last month remain. Geoff Johns is one of the best writers in the business but the structure of this saga is maddening! I have no problem with the concept of The Others. In fact, that's the single best aspect of this story thus far! I just wish Johns would have introduced us to them in a single issue flashback story rather than slowly doling out information one flashback at a time in the midst of three other stories at three separate points in time.

Johns is a great idea man and there's a lot of great character concepts here. A Russian Cosmonaut bred and conditioned to survive in the vacuum of space? A prisoner of war who has some kind of empathy-based powers due to a magical set of chains? Heck, even Ya'Wara is a novelty since it is so rare to see a non-Caucasian jungle queen character in American comics. I had hoped we would see more new characters like this in the New 52 and it's disappointing that we don't know anything about these characters. Perhaps it was Johns' intent to leave us wanting more? If so, he's done his job well but it is still an annoyance.

Again, while I may grouse about Johns' story structure, I cannot complain about Ivan Reis' artwork. It is as great s ever and the inking and coloring team bring his pencils to their full fruition. I should also note that the character designs are all memorable and distinctive.

This is a great book and a must-read for all comic fans but I suspect it will read better in the Trades than as a monthly title.